Since May, this season's crop of MasterChef hopefuls have been thrown a lot of curveballs.

Making a dozen immaculate donuts, elevating canned food, baking three pies in two hours and sculpting a croquembouche – basically a tower of cream puffs bound by caramel – in ninety minutes were just a handful of the heart-racing challenges.

Pamela Anderson, Bill Rancic, Christy Turlington, Patrick Wilson, Joe Bastianich and Paul Scheer all completed the grueling 26.2-mile ING New York City Marathon on Sunday – in the name of charitable causes.

From MasterChef's Bastianich celebrating with a glass of wine (and well wishes from Tom Colicchio) to Anderson icing down her entire body (and posting a photo to prove it) and to supportive spouses cheering along the race route (like Giuliana Rancic) here's how Hollywood commemorated making it to the finish line:

The first mystery box tag team challenge proved a little too much for Krissi's abilities as well as her self-restraint. I don't mind a little eleventh hour drama, but there's a major lack of frustration tolerance there that sadly is her biggest hindrance. Yelling may be par for the course in our fast paced profession, but abandoning the line doesn't fly in a real kitchen.

This is the final four of MasterChef – you don't take a time out! It is truly a shame, because she has grown significantly in the last three months. Love her or hate her, Krissi, the consummate underdog, held her own this season.

With only five home cooks left from what was arguably our strongest crop of contestants in the history of MasterChef, they should expect only the unexpected. We wanted to test just how capable our finalists could be at integrating and manipulating a true smorgasbord of ingredients into a restaurant quality dish.

This week's MasterChef episode featured the highly anticipated (and dreaded) restaurant takeover! For me, this is one of the highlights of every season. We were honored – and nervous – to be given the reins of the great Wolfgang Puck's amazing L.A. eatery, WP 24.

Performing in a professional restaurant kitchen at this high a level is always a turning point for our remaining home cooks. The pressure, the heat, the almost impossibly fast pace at which you need work – this is the reality of working in the culinary industry. This is what professional chefs do night after night.

Wednesday's episode of MasterChef featured our final seven contestants facing not one, but two protein-centric challenges. Talk about a warm welcome back for Bri!

In hindsight, I think the T-bone challenge was a little elementary for this group, given the late stage of the competition. Even with the expected elevation factor, if our home cooks can't nail this in their sleep, then we are all doing something wrong.

Jordan pretty much summed up the collective sentiments of the group regarding the possible reentry of Lynn. Despite his untimely exit, everyone knows that Lynn is the most technically advanced home cook to come out of Season 4. Although a favorite amongst his peers, the viewers, and us judges, competition-wise he is his fellow home cooks' worst nightmare.